“Scotland will lead the way. Spain has its political boots on the stolen rock in the south of the continent. As always - England’s difficulty remains Ireland’s opportunity.

“When I voted Leave I was not following the ideology of the despicable Farage but the revolutionary Connolly. I was rejecting a Europe that left Aylan Kurdi on its barbed wire shores rather than provide the child with shelter from European bombs.

“The neo-liberal capitalism that has seen a union of nations reduced to the rape of social welfare in the pursuit of greater profits for elites. I was rejecting attacks on the working poor, the most vulnerable, austerity programmes. I was saying no more to banks and financial institutions being more powerful than sovereign nations.

“There are 100 more horrible consequences to European neo-liberalism I was comprehensively rejecting. But most of all I wanted to give two fingers to Jean Claude Junker’s Troika of European Commission, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank, who formed a group of international lenders that asset stripped European socialism via austerity measures when they provided ‘weighted’ bailouts, for indebted European states, among them, Ireland and Greece.

“The Irish people have been humiliated by the European troika. In the 26 counties 4.5m people have been asked to repay £64b of Banking debt. Not the Irish people’s debt - but banks. Water charges, hospital closures, food banks and evictions are par for the course.

“The North has an opportunity to ignore the psychobabble of its first minister and press for negations with both Dublin, sympathetic ears in London and a reformed Brussels given the North’s mandate at this week’s polls. Any pressing for a six county border poll should be ignored as it is only populist, has both Tory protection in the form of Theresa Villiers and a built-in sectarian majority that will ensure its defeat. The requests for a border poll are simply a fig-leaf to cover political inadequacies.

“It is now time to think big. Take the opportunities England’s own goal has provided and strike hard for a new Ireland in a significantly reformed Europe. The debates and their consequences must be handled with sensitivity.

“Following the political upheaval of the last week, the O’Bradaigh - O’Conaill proposals for a New Ireland (Eíre Nua) could be viewed as the basis for a move to reassure Unionists in a federal Ireland. The requests for a border poll only serve to alienate Unionists in Ireland. The two greatest opportunities have manifest themselves in the last week. Europe is under severe pressure to reform in line with its founding principles while the results will lead to the breakup of the UK.”

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